The Adventures of Jim & Rhonda

As another year draws to a close I’m once again astonished at how quickly time passes by these days. Here I am, another year old, and still in my cubicle, dreaming of being back on the road. I am attempting to exercise patience….never one of my greatest strengths!

In some ways it feels as though we just returned from our RTW. I can still SMELL the streets of India, TASTE the noodle breakfasts in SE Asia, SEE the sundowns over Africa. And yet, it also feels like forever ago and I have antsy feet. I am incredibly grateful for each and ever moment of our travels over the years and yet, at this moment, I am also incredibly grateful for our life in general. Along with all the amazing experiences we’ve had over the years I also remember the not as amazing experiences…the horrific beds, cold showers, cramped bus rides and a whole lot of bugs, and thank God everyday for my comfortable bed and hot shower. Do I want to get back out in the world, absolutely, but I am certainly going to make sure to express my gratitude at the comfortable life we lead here in the United States.

Having spent much time in parts of the world where people don’t have choices and are merely working hard to survive, my main focus at this time is GRATITUDE. As I sit in my cubicle, bored even though I have work, restless even though I feel exhausted, irritated with the small things not working my way, I take a moment to realize many people in this country and around the world would gladly take my job any day of the week and be grateful for the opportunity to be able to pay their mortgage and feed their children.

We have several close friends who have family members experiencing serious health issues, most poignent ly Avrey, a friends niece who is 11years old and has spent 4 of those years battling cancer. Every caringbridge journal entry rips my heart out and we are helpless to “fix it”. More than ever I am grateful for our health and the health of our family and pray everyday for our friends who are less fortunate.

We are grateful for our wonderful friends and family. We are truly blessed with amazing people in our lives. Our day to day existence is enhanced by having such inspiring people around us.

In this past year we have increased our friends many times over by networking amongst other travelers. I am often in awe that in a 30minute lunch period I can catch up with Warren & Betsy in Chiang Mai (marriedwithluggage.com), Tree & Stevie in Peru (sprinterlife.com) and Kim & Brian (so-many-places.com) here in Portland who are preparing to embark soon on their dream trip. I am grateful for the technology that allows us to create a network of friends around the world who are truly our biggest inspiration to follow the life of our dreams rather than following the status quo.

Finally, I am deeply grateful still for being married to the most wonderful man in the world, truly my soul mate. After nearly 24 years together I am even more in love with him than ever and excited everyday to continue this journey along the road of life together. This love, along with our love for our amazing dog, Maddy, makes our little family complete. Maddy has brought great joy into both of our lives and it is truly a case of “who rescued who”.

2012 is sure to be full of challenges for many of us. As I occasionally feel stressed regarding my reduced work hours and smaller pay at work, I take the time to focus on the fact that we are still ok. We are SO incredibly rich in more ways than money can measure and in comparison to many are even rich in that way. We are increasingly excited about continuing our plans for our roadtrip to South America and anxious to spend many more nights in our camper having fun with friends. I am going to continue to live each day fully and create a life we want to lead.

Best wishes to all our friends and family around the world for a healthy, happy, and inspired 2012!

With gratitude,

Rhonda & Jim

I apologize to anyone who faithfully followed along on our RTW blog and homecoming only to have me completely drop the ball over the last (gasp!) 2 years. A lot has happen, and I will spend some time blogging about those events, but even more importantly, some big things are going to be happening!

This entry I’ll just do a quick recap. In late 2009, when I left off, I was back working at my old job at Grand European Tours and Jim was working in inside sales. We were making less money than before we left but our situation had improved from the life of PT retail for me and 14hr days of Schwans sales for him and, we had itchy feet. Without the means to flee the country again we decided on a plan. We would attempt to re-create our last couple of years before our RTW trip. We would buy a house, fix it up, pay off our newly accumulated debt, sell in a couple of years and take our money and run, this time having a lot more insight on how to really do a RTW trip well.

We did buy a house in early 2010, adopted the most wonderful dog in the world… a black lab mix AKA “designer dog” these days, we named Maddy but often refer to as blackdog, and moved to the country. The plan was to spend a couple of years getting things figured out and to travel around South America and Antartica, the only continents we had not yet conquered.

While celebrating our 20th anniversary on the beach in Puerto Vallarta, one of our favorite places on Earth, I suddenly had an epiphany….I turned to Jim and said “Why don’t we drive to South America instead of taking public transportation?” He replied “do people do that?” I had no idea, and even now have no idea why I asked the question or why I suddenly knew that we were destined to make that drive.

Once we returned home I started researching the subject and found out that not only had quite a few people made such a drive but a lot more were doing it as I searched. With that in mind we started searching for our ideal roadtrip vehicle. We decided on a Toyota Tundra w/ a pop top Palomino Bronco camper on the back and purchased them early this year. We’ve spent over 30nights camping in them so far and are loving life and can’t wait to get on the road full time. The two main things we disliked about our backpacking RTW was the horrific beds and not being able to cook easily. Both problems solved!

Now, we’re hitting full stride. Planning and plotting. Saving and selling. We’ll get everything updated on this blog and eventually create our own website as we now strive towards creating a location independent lifestyle. What we learned on our trip and since our return is that we are most alive when on the road, meeting people, discovering all the fascinating things this world has to offer. And, isn’t that what it’s all about!

Stay tuned for more details about our adventures the last 2 years and much more regarding the upcoming changes.

Cheers,

Rhonda & Jim

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